Youtube Tips and Trick, make money from YouTube
All you need to know how to make money from your YouTube channel
If you have been on YouTube for a while, then you might be someone maybe who wants to refresh some of the ideas or get new ideas or just want to maybe compare with other channels like mine for example. This is not the typical this is what you should do, the sweet talk. This is gonna work for you 100%. This is gonna be as real as it gets. I'm gonna be sharing my journey, my experience and I'm going to be honest as much as I can.
I will share with you sources of income. Most of those sources I already created myself so I can tell you if they're really working, if it is worth getting into. And I can tell you which sources are not worth getting into. There's 1 source which is not working for me. I'm actually in minus. I'm losing money. There there are a few income sources which I still need to create myself.
I've been on YouTube for 3.5 years. The first year I didn't make anything. I made very little. So it was pretty much not even a part-time job. A year later, I could call it a pretty good part-time job and now I would say a little over a year now, I am calling this full-time job. Meaning that I'm also making full-time income. I think I became a full-time youtuber when I was at around 40,000 subscribers. That was in March 2020. Now, the year 2020 from March till about December was a very special year. Everybody was staying home due to pandemic. Everybody was doing online shopping. The watch time was crazy. People were spending money and all that so that's one of the reasons why I could call it full-time income with only 40,000 subscribers. If I had now 40,000 subscribers, it would be only a part-time job. Today I'm at 98,000 subscribers. If you think that my income is way higher or even doubled, you are way off. It's actually way lower. I can still call it full time but I really need to be proactive to keep it that way. Pandemic has affected the whole global economy. There is a lot less money for advertisement. People are shopping less. Everything is being affected, recovery will be a long process.
Let's bring the income sources, here we go.
SOURCE no.1
I have placed products as the first source of income. From my own personal experience before I hit 1,000 subscribers and I was able to monetize the channel, companies started to offer me products for reviews. Now, when you get those products you can keep them to upgrade your kit. My channel was all about photography and videos so I was keeping it to upgrade my kit. Or the products you didn't want to keep, you could sell. Companies are always looking for quality in-depth reviews. If they see something in you, if they believe that your channel is going to grow and bring a lot more customers to them, they will contact you.
Moza was the first company which actually believed in me. Till this day I still can't believe they actually sent me the gimbal they did. One day I opened the doors and then at the front doorstep there was big package Moza Air 2 gimbal. Very expensive gimbal. I just could not believe it at that time. I was in pure shock that they would send something like this to me.
To get into product reviews, it is the best if you review a product you already have or you recently bought so the product is kind of new on the market. Now, I used to email companies all the time trying to get the products for reviews but I never heard back from them or if I heard back, it was always a negative response. If companies want to work with you, they will come to you. That's my experience. They will not send you products they already have on the market for a while, they're only interested in promoting new product they're about to launch or they recently launched.
Now to create a product review is a lot of work. You have to learn everything about the product. So you need to read the manual inside out, you have to use it, you have to test it and most importantly you need to have answers for every single question being asked in the comment section. Some of the products I sold but majority of them I'm keeping because then I can down the road create comparison videos of several products.
SOURCE no.2
Second natural source of income would be affiliate marketing. Whenever you're showing a product in a video, you're reviewing a product or you're using certain product or tool within your video, within a tutorial, it is a good idea to link the product below the video in a video description through affiliate link. I have many people asking me what type of microphone I'm using, where can I buy it or even the light or even just the remote or some kind of a little filter. When you list it below and someone happens to click the link, you will receive small commission. It can be anywhere from 5% to 15 or even more depending on a product. Now the viewer is not gonna pay anything extra. Amazon has a great affiliate program. They used to pay a lot more, they really cut it now but it is still worth it to sign up with them and again because I review camera gear, for me another natural store for me would be B&H which I'm using as well. You might want to ask that particular brand which sent you the product if they have their own affiliate program. Most of the companies are not going to tell you that. They don't really care about the affiliate program. They just want to make sure that you posted their link to the product below the video. It is really up to you to make the research, to make sure that all the links are going through affiliate programs. Product affiliate marketing is for me the strongest source of income. Last month I made about 1,500 dollars.
SOURCE no.3
Another important part of affiliate marketing would be subscription based software or service. This is something I am not doing and I'm making an enormous mistake. There are a number of companies which are offering this recurring affiliate programs meaning that if somebody purchases the product or the service through your link, once they renew it in the future, you will keep getting the commission as long as they always renew services such as Active Campaign, Hub staff, Builderall SEO, Active Trail would be some of them. You need to search companies which are suitable for your niche, the topic you are talking about in your videos. Now, you're not going to grow this side income overnight. This is going to take for a while. The more people you will get over the years and they will stay, they will always renew, the more income you will be getting. Don't ask me why I'm not doing this.
Once you reach 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of overall watch time, you will be able to monetize your channel. You can make anywhere between 0.01 to 0.03 sometimes it is more depending on many factors. Your niche, what the video is all about, the number of views you get, number of clicks, ad quality, if someone is using ad blocker and also video length. How many commercials you run in the video. When people skip the ads, they don't watch them, you will make nothing or very little so you need to kind of make sure that people are actually not skipping ads, they are running them. Now, YouTube ads is not a strong income. Now at 98,000 subscribers last month I made 950 dollars. A year ago in 2020, early 2020, when I had about 40,000 subscribers, I was making double. This is how things went down.
SOURCE no.4
For me, 4th income stream is stock photography and video. Whenever I'm doing some kind of a B-roll, I'm filming where I'm not talking or taking photos for Instagram and other social media, all the videos and all the photos are going to stock agencies to be sold instead of just having them sitting on a hard drive. Now, I've been doing stock since 2007 and my portfolio is extensive there. It takes a while to build up income there. I took a break last 2 years because I really needed to concentrate only on YouTube. 2 months ago I returned to it thanks to Wirestock. I simply dump all photos and videos on them. That's all I do. They do the rest for me. I have made a whole playlist about stock photography and video, I will link it below for those interested as well as Wirestock. You will find out how it works, what to submit and what not to submit and all that. Since I'm not as active on stock as I was 2 years ago, I'm not making the same money as I used to make definitely with stock photography and video. So last month it was only about 700 dollars.
Before I continue with other income streams, I want to mention one thing. You don't want to create all income streams at the ones because you will get extremely overwhelmed. It is a lot of work. You need to think it through, create one. Once it is finished and running and it's doing okay, then move on to next one. It took me 3 years to go through majority of them and I still need to create few other ones.
SOURCE no.5
Another income stream could be physical products or merch. Now, certain type of products will work for certain types of people. This is an area where I'm actually losing money. I've created the typical youtubers merch line, the clothes, you know the t-shirts, hoodies, hats and all that. So far I only sold 2 items. The problem is that I'm paying a monthly fee for an online store to Shopify so I'm actually losing money. I'm not making anything but I'm losing money. I could have gotten cheaper way or freeway to create an online store directly with YouTube but quality was very important to me. I ordered samples from several companies and from what I got, I simply could not offer that type of quality to my subscribers. It's just no. That's why I decided to go with a Spreadshirt company instead. I wore those t-shirts in my videos quite a bit. Even the hoodie quite a bit and I always linked it below the videos in the video description but I guess, it's not attractive to my subscribers enough. Maybe it is a design, maybe I need to change the design and make something bold like a camera with some funny slogan. I don't know.
Quite recently I started thinking about creating different products all together. More suitable for me and for my niche. I am thinking about physical prints. Autographed physical print or better yet I'm thinking about putting together a photo book. One of the books would be the best of photography I've ever taken since 2007. So everything from those years. Of course, there will be a very limited edition and it will be autographed or I'm also thinking the other option would be printing a photo book on a yearly basis which would feature the best photography from that year. Also limited edition, autographed.
Bottom line, when it comes to physical products, merch, you need to figure out in your niche what will work for you. What might work for others might not necessarily work for you.
Offering digital products would be another way, typical way of monetizing this channel in my niche which is photography and video. I tried to create one Luts set just to test it out. I sold about 3 or 4, not much as those were just indoor Luts. I am getting some requests to create more outdoors photography presets and Luts so I know that I should be investing more time into that as well.
SOURCE no.6
And again, depending on your niche, difficulty of the videos you create, how much time you put into the videos and how much time you actually have left, you might consider offering private lessons or online coaching. Over the past 3years I have received many requests for private lessons and coaching. Unfortunately though, I am very limited with the time I can work. I have a family and kids so just to create videos for YouTube sometimes it's very stressful for me to keep up with the schedule. If you are someone who has this extra time and is able to offer that type of service, I strongly believe that you can generate some pretty good income that way.
SOURCE no.7
What is Patreon? It's a membership platform where creators can get paid by creating things for fans such as behind the scenes content, free Luts and presets, extra tutorials and courses, bonus items. Members pay monthly. I've done Patreon in the past I believe when I had about 30,000 subscribers and I offered everything I mentioned plus also feedback on photos and videos. I closed Patreon once YouTube offered me YouTube memberships for a very simple reason. I wanted to keep everything under one roof. Was it a good move?
SOURCE no.8
Let's talk about YoTtube memberships. Once your channel grows, you will have a lot more subscribers, YouTube will offer you the option to open a membership area. It is very similar to Patreon where people will pay a monthly fee of your choice to get the extras. It's pretty much the same. I offer exclusive behind the scenes and updates, members polls, blasts from the past, Luts and presets and members videos only. Is it worth it? How does it compare to Patreon? I thought that by having this thing always visible on my channel, the join button, having it all under one roof will bring more attention. I was very wrong. I currently have only 9 members. So my last month's income from the YouTube memberships was 25 dollars which is very low. On Patreon I used to have many more members. I still like the fact that it is one roof though on YouTube. The best would be to right now review all the offerings. Maybe offer some extra courses in that and just promote and promote and promote. If I was about to start all over again, I would stay with Patreon. I would not get into YouTube memberships but again I still like that it is under one roof. I will give it another try for next 6 months but if I don't see changes, I'm gonna make some changes there as well, I will have to go back to Patreon.
SOURCE no.9
Once your channel grows even more, first sponsorship offers will arrive. I think I was getting my first offers about a year ago. I am very picky who I'm gonna choose to work with, who I'm gonna sign up with. There is a service called Social Blue Book which will literally tell you how much you should be charging for a dedicated video, shout out or short one minute mention. You have to pay for that service, it's not free to find out your worth. However, if you are using Tube Buddy which is a must to use to help you grow your channel the right way, I'll link it below in the video description, it has already built in channel valuation powered by Social Blue Book. You can see your suggested price right there. I'll create a video on a channel growth in the future and I'll dive deep into Tube Buddy as it really makes a huge difference when it comes to SEO search engine optimization, getting the traffic to your videos. It does make a huge difference. The type of sponsorship I got was short one-minute mention of Skillshare, Squarespace and recently Epidemic Sound. I only got 3 dedicated videos so far. Until now I was only doing free product reviews. I told myself that once I hit 100k things will change and I will have to start charging something for product reviews unless the product is so hot on the market that it will bring an enormous amount of views. Product reviews are actually bringing the channel down at these times. This year you get a lot less views unless it is the hottest product on the market. At this time tutorials, real world vlogs, where you are being yourself so people can relate to you are the hot topics. Not product reviews. Many people are stressed and they simply want friend, they need somebody they can relate to. A lot of people lost their jobs, their life turned upside down.
SOURCE no.10
Courses are one of the strongest income streams you can have for your channel if you already have large following. I gave myself the goal to reach first 100k subscribers before I even consider creating something like that. It was a very good move because it gave me enough time to expand my knowledge and to learn a lot more about my audience, what my audience would be interested in. There are places where you can sell your courses. Skillshare is one of them, Shopify and Teachable.com. You can offer them through Patreon or even YouTube membership areas as well. I'm not in that stage yet. I'm still about to hit 100K. If I decide to create a course, it's going to be a large project on its own. I have to write it, film and edit. It's going to be a big project. If you are in a position that you already feel confident enough that you have large enough following and you have enough to share, then you can certainly create a course. It should be one of the strongest income streams for you.
I would like to close this video with the following. There was one comment which I got on one of my recent videos or in my community posts. I don't know exactly where it was. The person who wrote this said something along these lines. What you should do is post videos on how to edit in free apps, no Adobe and stuff because people have no money. You should only concentrate on free and budget stuff. Why am I saying this? It has lots to do with the way you choose to monetize your channel. The last few videos I tried to concentrate more on budget stuff and free stuff and filming with a smartphone. Although it brought me quite a bit of views and a lot of more new subscribers, when it comes to affiliate marketing income, there has been a massive drop. A healthy mix of some free and budget content and some more advanced and upscale photography and video tutorials would be a much better choice. You have to really think about your audience who is it you're serving your videos to. Then you can think what would be the best way to earn income from your channel so you can actually do this full time. It's not easy to do this full time so you do need to do lots of thinking, planning and be ready to change instantly. You will have to do many tests like I'm doing especially this year. You will have to see what's working for you and what's not. You will be always on your tippy toes but it is an adventure worth fighting for.
Affiliate disclaimer: Some of these links go to one of my websites and some are affiliate links such as Amazon and B&H where I'll earn a small commission if you make a purchase at no additional cost to you.